


The Funeral

by Northofthewall



Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-08
Updated: 2017-09-08
Packaged: 2018-12-25 09:46:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 766
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12033351
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Northofthewall/pseuds/Northofthewall
Summary: You can tell by the title this isn't gonna be super fun, right?





	The Funeral

He hated funerals. Even this one sucked. He hated the forced sharing of grief and conversation. He guessed it didn't really matter what he thought though. This one wasn't for him. Not really. This was for them, standing around the grave in black or dress blues. 

He hung back on the low rise of grass a line of old trees delineated. The wind that would have been cold blew right through him and he looked down and realised he was still in his pyjamas.  
"Damn it."

There was someone standing beside him and he wondered how long he'd had company and why he'd only just noticed. There'd been a day nobody could creep up on him. It was rather unexpected too, at this time and in this place, although it also felt strangely familiar. The face took a minute for him to place. His mind had been sluggish and traitorous at late, although today he was feeling rather light and quick. 

It was the clothes and the hair that gave name to the face at last. Skaara. 

"I thought you ascended," he said, and he was almost certain he had remembered the detail correctly. "A really long time ago," he added. Yeah, this was one who didn't die. Lost. Not dead.  
"I did."  
"I didn't," he said. He definitely hadn't ascended. He remembered all too well.  
"No you did not."  
"Then...?" he gestured at Skaara as if to question his presence.  
"It is complicated."  
"Isn't it always?"  
"I am here to assist you O'Neill," Skaara grinned.  
Jack considered the smiling boyish face for a moment.  
"Good to see you though," he said.  
"And you O'Neill."

Jack's gaze turned back to the dark figures around the grave. The widow stood tall, her chin up, just frowning as she was handed a flag. She looked skyward briefly but not for him. He knew she was trying hard to stop tears she really didn't want to show. The lady who had become part daughter part sister placed a hand of comfort. There were other figures too, familiar and beloved faces, serious expressions and tense jaws. It was a relief to see so few tears though. He had after all, lived a long happy life in the end, and he'd already said his goodbyes to the people that mattered most. 

"They will be ok," Skaara said, and it didn't sound like a platitude. It sounded like he really knew. It helped.  
"Yeah?"  
"Yes. Do not worry O'Neill."  
"Right."

Was it that easy? He thought about his life and the second chance he'd had, the extension, the happiness he always felt like he didn't altogether deserve. He thought about that slow, cold end that came in a bed and not hot and fast on a battlefield as he'd expected. He wasn't sure how he felt about that. The past few months had been hell and he wished he hadn't had to put her through that. He was glad it was over. He thought about her, everything he loved, everything he would miss. And he thought about how she would hate him going off on this adventure without her. But it wasn't her time, not by a long shot. 

"So what now?" he asked. "I wasn't expecting anything."  
"You will see."  
"Is it bad?"  
Skaara frowned at him. "Why do you think it will be bad?"  
"Because... you know... what I've done."  
"O'Neill. You are lucky that self recrimination does not determine your next path."  
He didn't know what to say to that. He was sure that if there was an afterlife (and for Charlie's sake he always did hope there was), that he'd be taking a ride to the basement.  
"All is going to be well O'Neill. Look," Skaara pointed between two trees. 

He looked and at first saw nothing. Then the dappled light that filtered through oak leaves became brighter. As he watched, with curiosity more than fear, it coalesced into a patch of light that hung in the air. He wasn't sure if the light got bigger or he got closer, but now there was mostly just a warm-ish brightness and vague shadows of trees and a place left behind. There was a figure at the centre of the light, small but approaching. Now it seemed to Jack as if the figure broke out into a run, in a way that reminded him of summers and boyhood and something lost so long ago. He didn't have a body, or a physical heart anymore, so the expectant, clenching feeling pervaded his entire being. The running figure became a boy.  
"Daddy!"


End file.
